With the entire boxing world eagerly waiting for the announcement of Anthony Joshua’s huge unification clash with Tyson Fury, it seems that the sport’s leading figures all have an opinion on the fight. Teddy Atlas, the ex-trainer of Mike Tyson, has long been a student of the heavyweight division and he’s firm in his belief that Fury will make it a hard night for his U.K. counterpart.
“I’m going with Fury,” revealed Atlas on his The Fight podcast. “He showed me he can go get you now and he can box and can pot shot and move. Joshua can punch, Joshua’s a banger. He gets into position, but he’s going to have to get into that position.
“Fury is more versatile, Fury has more say because he can do more things. He can control the outside if he wants and not make it easy for Joshua to get into his geography so to speak, which I like to talk about. It’s going to be a humongous fight.”
Possessing a confident manner when offering his thoughts on boxing’s biggest clash, a fight rumoured to be worth over £200m, Atlas was quick to point to the lowest moment of Joshua’s career when the 2012 Olympic gold medalist was stopped in seven rounds by the unfancied Andy Ruiz in June 2019.
“I think Fury could stop him. I like AJ, he's a good fighter, he's got good talent, he's had a great comeback. I like all that. I'm not going to say he has a China chin, I'm not going to say that but I'm gonna say Fury has a better chin, and I'm going to say he's been to dark places when he got stopped by Ruiz. He being Joshua. He went to dark places.
“Now he found a light and he lit the room up and he's back into a place that's lit. I just don't think he's that far away from a power shortage. I think there could be a blackout again, where his confidence [goes].
“When I say the electricity, the light, I attach it to confidence, belief, mental strength and durability. I think that a blackout could happen in that generator of his again. He's not far from removed from being taken back to no lights. So I'm going with Fury.”